Peter Moore: Asha Sharma er en meget kompetent leder, der vil skulle forklare AI til gamerne

Emnet AI i gaming har domineret diskussionerne om spil det seneste år, hvor mange mener, at det er uinspirerende at skabe spil på denne måde, mens andre mener, at det ikke giver særligt gode eller innovative resultater, da AI ofte skaber ting baseret på, hvad andre allerede har gjort.

Men samtidig er det en uundgåelig kendsgerning, at AI allerede har været brugt i spilverdenen i årevis, og det er et uundværligt værktøj, der kan spare enormt meget tid ved blandt andet at fremskynde skabelsen af ting, der skal masseproduceres. Nu har måske den mest populære Xbox-boss nogensinde, og også tidligere Sega-boss Peter Moore, i et GamesBeat-interview kommenteret udnævnelsen af den tidligere AI-boss Asha Sharma som Phil Spencers efterfølger, hvor han giver sit syn på AI i spiludvikling og hendes rolle:

"AI is despised by gamers right now, who see it as a false way of creating games, a lazy way, a conveyor belt way. She's gotta expect that. But we, as an industry, in game development, have been using forms of artificial intelligence forever. It's just something that ultimately Microsoft needs to figure out exactly your question. Is she there because she's AI? Or is she there, which is my hope, because she's proven herself within the Borg at Microsoft and been a very capable executive leader, and this is a great challenge for her, and they wanted to do something different?"

Moore fortsætter sit argument og forklarer, at det er vigtigt for Sharma at vise, hvordan AI kan være noget positivt for gamere, og mener, at dette er noget, branchen indtil videre har fejlet:

"I think her mantra has to be—it's good for gaming if AI serves the player, not the spreadsheet. She has to be able to explain that. The studios are all going to use artificial intelligence in one form or another. I don't think the gamer really understands what it all means and how things come together in that way. But I think she has that great opportunity to bridge both worlds and serve growth and deeper immersive experiences. Games that are fundamentally less expensive. Maybe we get games that are better, faster, cheaper, because the cost of game development for triple-A games has become immense. Over the decades I've been involved, it's become this massive manual labor thing, hundreds if not thousands of people working on a game. That's the key. She has that. If I'm her, I have this unique perspective. I just have to turn it into a positive in the eyes of the gamer."

I det indsigtsfulde interview (Moore er altid interessant og har mere erfaring end nogen anden efter sin tid som chef for Sega, Xbox og EA), adresserer han også den kritik, Sharma har modtaget for sin manglende erfaring med gaming, og minder os om, at han arbejdede med sko, før han blev en af de mest succesfulde chefer i spilbranchen nogensinde:

"I guess the best way—that was me at Sega. I'd come from Reebok, if you remember. I was a shoe guy."